Some medical systems include resuscitation and life support systems. A resuscitation system can include a defibrillator and a life support system can include pacemakers, ventilators, and a circulation support system. Prior art portable resuscitation systems are mostly directed to automatic external defibrillators (AEDs) and circulation resuscitators. These systems generally include portable airway resuscitators and portable breathing resuscitators. However, for emergency personal to carry and handle all of these devices separately is not efficient. Further, time lost by the emergency personal in gathering all of these devices and carrying them to a patient is critical. Therefore, there is a need to provide a single modular resuscitator system that is portable and includes modular devices that are directed to airway, breathing, and circulation (ABC) resuscitation. It is also preferred to save costs by having the ability to adapt to new modular devices as specific technology evolves.
In addition, 80% of cardiac arrest occurs outside the hospital often leading to critical time being wasted by emergency personal trying to locate the patient and/or communicate with an emergency center and/or healthcare facility and/or provider. For communications between the rescuer or the patient and the emergency center and/or healthcare facility and/or provider separate devices such as wireless or wire line telecommunication units are well known and used. However, if neither is readily available, the patient or rescuer is left by themselves. The ability to communicate reliable information quickly back and forth between everyone is extremely important but not readily provided. Hence, there is a need to solve these problems by providing a modular and integrated telecommunication unit to each resuscitator device.
In the difficulty of locating the patient, the emergency personal has nothing to rely on other than information given to them by a 911 center or if the patient or a third party with the patient is able to communicate their location. The prior art is devoid of a resuscitator with any ability to communicate a patient location. This can be invaluable when a patient is in distress or arrest and when the time for finding the victim can make all the difference in saving his or her life. This can also provide tremendous aid to rescue personnel and reduce the confusion and time required in finding victims, a costly issue for their time as well as potentially the patient's life.
It is known that resuscitators, and especially ventilators, do not exist to maintain ABC resuscitation procedures. As such, an integrated device and protocol program which coordinates the ventilator with defibrillation, cardiac (or heart) pacing, CPR, etc. does not exist. However, such devices are needed to enhance the speed and success of all these procedures. For example, defibrillation should occur near the peak of respiratory expiration and is more successful when done this way. There is also a need to improve oxygen delivery to oxygen starved tissues. This increases the ability to save the life of a cardiac arrest victim, or at least sustain the victim until advanced care arrives increasing the probability of ultimate survival. A system is needed in all emergency and prolonged ventilation procedures for providing simple, safe, and reliable ventilation. The prior art does recognize the need to introduce various chemical agents or regimens into a cardiac arrest patient. Some of these agents are introduced via the trachea and airway through aerosols or nebulizations. The prior art does not provide for any additional ionizing techniques to accelerate the introduction of the agent into the patient. There is a need for an ion infusion system that improves oxygen and agent or regimen delivery to oxygen starved tissues. There is also a need to more rapidly introduce agents via the airway, trachea, and lungs into a cardiac arrest victim. It is accepted that the rapid infusion of oxygen and epinephrine, etc. into the bloodstream will help save the heart and brain of an arrest victim.
The use of resuscitators has long been reserved to highly trained personnel. With the federal government endorsing the use of resuscitators, such as AEDs, by the general public, the ability to train and/or instruct the general populace with the proper placement of monitoring, defibrillation, and/or pacing pads, ventilation masks, or airways, and the general use of resuscitation procedures has now become vital. There is a need to make the use of resuscitators easy for the average person so that he or she can use the resuscitator effectively. Currently, resuscitators come with complicated instruction manuals and confusing displays. Visual and voice prompt resuscitators do exist in the marketplace, however, the images and displays are difficult to understand. In order to cut manufacturing costs, the use of liquid crystal displays has been reduced or eliminated. While the resuscitators may display illustrations or instructions, the user must interpret these quickly. Vital time is passing for the critical patient while the user takes time to figure this out. There is a need to provide a simple, less confusing, inexpensive, and clearer display of information that guides the user and eases the proper operation and use of the resuscitator.
Defibrillators commonly provide high amplitude electrical pulses or defibrillator shocks with relatively short durations. Typical high amplitude pulses are generally 1000 volts (V) to 3000 V and range in duration from about 10 milliseconds (ms) to 40 ms. High amplitude electrical pulses may damage heart tissue and short duration electrical pulses may not adequately halt chaotic depolarizing waves of the heart. Further, high amplitude defibrillators tend to be higher in both size and cost. In the new retail markets for AEDs, size and cost are very critical. Today's defibrillators are also not electrically designed to be “constant current” shock devices. Hence, the electrical characteristics or outcome of each shock is highly unpredictable. There is a need to produce smaller and less costly defibrillators with more predictable electrical characteristics.
Overdrive heart pacing is a technique, similar to defibrillation, of over-riding heart ‘chaos’ (tachyarrhythmia or fibrillation) whereby many small amplitude pacing pulses are delivered in rapid succession. After defibrillator shocks, sometimes the patient is converted to heart standstill (asystole). This could be an electrical problem with the heart and these victims are commonly provided with Cardio Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) instead of being paced right away. The fibrillating heart operates like it has irregular tissue depolarizing waves through it at about 600 ms to 800 ms duration, in which case fibrillation never exists in the first place and only tachycardia (very rapid heartbeats) exists, or multiple waves of tachycardia. This also suggests that short duration defibrillator pulses are not long enough in commercial defibrillators. This means that patients may be overdrive paced instead of defibrillated. This is because the treatment primarily prescribed for tachyarrhythmia is overdrive pacing or synchronized countershock, and defibrillation may be an improper interpretation and treatment.
Resuscitators typically include a pair electrode pads and there are two well accepted placements for them. In a first instance, the two pads are placed on the anterior or front portion of the patient's chest, known as anterior-anterior placement. In the first instance, one of the pads is placed near the lower left of the patient's thorax near the heart's apex and the other one is positioned on the upper right thorax to the right of the patient's sternum. In a second instance, a first electrode pad is positioned at the common apex position and the second electrode pad is positioned on the posterior or back of the patient behind the heart. In the second instance, the positioning of the electrode pads is typically called anterior-posterior placement. If these same pads are used for external cardiac pacing, the anterior-posterior electrode position is commonly preferred. However, no such resuscitator system exists for allowing the addition of a posterior electrode if anterior-anterior electrodes are already on the patient and then automatically switching to the preferred anterior-posterior mode for defibrillation and pacing. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an improved resuscitation system incorporating these features.